Abstract
George Sher’s recent book A Wild West of the Mind offers a sustained argument against moralism: the view that private mental states are not subject to the authority of moral obligation. In developing this argument, Sher first argues that leading normative theories cannot account for the wrongness of private mental states like beliefs, desires, or emotions. He then offers an argument that the countervailing value of moral freedom is itself a positive reason to reject moralism. Against Sher, I argue for a form of weak moralism. To do this, I first argue that the value of moral freedom does not clearly trump other significant values. I then support this argument by arguing that valuing anything at all puts rational constraints of private mental states. And because we have reason to value objects of moral value, we therefore have reason to conform our mental lives to those constraints.
Notes
1 Corinthians 10:23.
For a fuller version of this kind of argument, see Franklin (2013).
References
Scanlon, T.M. 2008. Moral Dimensions. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Sher, George. 2021. A Wild West of the Mind. New York: Oxford University Press.
Sher, George. 2006. In Praise of Blame. New York: Oxford University Press.
Wallace, R. Jay. 1994. Responsibility and the Moral Sentiments. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
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This article is part of a book symposium on “A Wild West of the Mind". All four articles were published in The Journal of Ethics, volume 27, issue 2.
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Coates, D.J. A Defense of Weak Moralism: A Reply to Sher. J Ethics 27, 131–140 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10892-023-09422-z
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10892-023-09422-z